In January of 2005, I accepted a position as dean of students at Dillard University in New Orleans, and, as with every position, I hit the ground running. I bonded with the university and the city early on and decided to purchase a home several months before my wife and I were scheduled to explore the real estate market. During our search we contemplated many community options, from Algiers to Mandeville, but settled on a two-story brick home in the Belair community in Slidell. Our closing was just in time for the birth of our second child, expected in early August, and the arrival of our first child, who was spending the summer with her grandparents in South Carolina.
During the summer, we experienced two low-category hurricanes that caused some wind damage to the campus and the usual flooding, but nothing life changing. Back then it seemed such a waste of time and resources to evacuate our students by bus to a host institution and lock down the campus, but these exercises were an unofficial rehearsal for what would come in late August.
Three weeks after the birth of our child, I requested a few days of family leave, which was happily granted by my supervisor. We were only supposed to be gone a few days, so we packed lightly. To make sure everyone was comfortable, I rented a small SUV, and we departed Slidell at about 9 p.m. on Friday, August 26, 2005.
By the time I made it to my mother’s house in Columbia, South Carolina, all news anchors were talking about this huge mass of energy in the Gulf headed for New Orleans. All the projections indicated that the storm would make a direct hit in two days.
While I was watching the news, my supervisor called to tell me that the campus was evacuating according to protocol and not to return to New Orleans until further notice.
For the next two days I was on pins and needles. Then, on Monday, August 29, 2005, when the storm hit New Orleans, my world turned upside down. All communications were cut off, the city was flooded, and mass hysteria played out on national television. I remember seeing images of people in the Superdome with no food, water or medicine crying for help, people stranded on rooftops and flashing signs in hopes of being rescued, and residents looting stores. I recall footage of parents with babies in hand, wading through filth and muck to reach dry land and heartbreaking stories of loved ones who were sucked into the storm’s vortex. I saw colorful graffiti on houses, walls and buildings cursing Katrina for her pillage and plunder of the beautiful Crescent City.
I remember seeing one resident pushing a big-screen television through flood waters and wondering why he would steal such a large appliance that would obviously not work after exposure to water and where he would use it since there was no power. Katrina made people do strange things, and this was by far the one of the most bizarre.
